Return of the ice cream freezer diver—or is it?!

Earlier this hot and muggy month, ice cream fans were shocked at the reckless behaviour of one young man who dove inside a freezer at a Lawson convenience store to beat the heat, planting his sweaty body all over the ice cream in the process. Ahhh, ice cream—a much-loved staple of many people’s diets. Look, I understand if you can’t handle the Japanese summer, but get your ass off my precious Yukimi Daifuku mochi ice cream, sonny!

Now another incriminating photo has surfaced on Twitter. Has the original perp returned? Or has another guy realized the kind of instant infamy achievable by molesting a freezer of ice cream…

The gentleman in the Twitpic above is flaunting rather than hiding his face. Although the user account @futo_1204 and original pic were soon deleted afterwards, the pic had already gone viral.

Here’s a rough translation of the accompanying Tweet:

“Returning home—Souta’s going mental. If you think this is insane, retweet pic.twitter.com/6SHYrIEB8V”

One Japanese netizen commented that because he said “returning home”, it implies that he lives in the same building as this convenience store. Others discovered that Futo (the owner of the account) lives in Kyoto, close to Yodo Station.

The Ministop convenience store whose freezer it was (Muko Terado-cho branch in Kyoto) issued a public apology for the incident, explaining that while staff were busy at the till, a customer got inside the ice cream freezer for this photo to be taken. Therefore, they are now taking action by getting rid of the ice cream and replacing the freezer. Ministop also commented that they take a stern view of such carryon which endangers customers’ safety and trust, and will be doing further staff training, including stepping up store patrols. In addition, any customers who purchased ice cream from this Ministop after the incident occurred and before it was discovered (from 8pm on the 23rd to 12pm on the 25th of July) can get a refund by producing their receipt. Finally, Ministop deeply apologized to all their customers for the “discomfort” and “inconvenience” caused by this incident. That seems more than fair!

The Lawson convenience store embroiled in the original incident actually fired its staff and shut down as a result.